


Can Anybody See is Anybody Waving Back at Me?

by Princessfbi



Series: Waving Through A Window [4]
Category: 9-1-1 (TV)
Genre: Anxiety, Bisexual Evan "Buck" Buckley, Crying, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/M, Flashbacks, Found Family, Hugs, Hurt Evan "Buck" Buckley, Hurt/Comfort, Implied/Referenced Child Neglect, Insecure Evan "Buck" Buckley, M/M, Mother-Son Relationship, Panic Attacks, Protective Athena Grant, Protective Eddie Diaz (9-1-1 TV), Protective Firefam, Sad with a Happy Ending, Self-Esteem Issues, Self-Worth Issues, Stalking, Therapy, Trauma Recovery, Worried Firefam, suffocation
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-23
Updated: 2020-11-23
Packaged: 2021-03-10 02:26:18
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 10,823
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27686222
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Princessfbi/pseuds/Princessfbi
Summary: “Uh…” Buck said, when he couldn’t think of what to say. “This isn’t what it looks like.”Athena’s brow arched high on her forehead, thoroughly unimpressed.“It looks like you’re planning on buying two-day old pastries to bring to a party I’m fairly certain my husband told you not to worry about.”And… Buck exhaled a shaky laugh.“That’s… Okay, it’s exactly what it looks like.”The fallout of 'Do You Ever Really Crash or Even Make a Sound?' and conclusion for this four part series.
Relationships: Athena Grant/Bobby Nash, Evan "Buck" Buckley & Athena Grant, Evan "Buck" Buckley & Bobby Nash, Evan "Buck" Buckley & Maddie Buckley, Evan "Buck" Buckley/Eddie Diaz (9-1-1 TV)
Series: Waving Through A Window [4]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1721746
Comments: 28
Kudos: 426





	Can Anybody See is Anybody Waving Back at Me?

The thing about Los Angeles, another city of lights in a world of nothing but city of lights, is that the only lights that matter are washed out from the pollution. The sun usually has a hazy film of smog blurring its lines and that seeps into the night and coats the stars.

Buck couldn’t see the stars. He was trying. The firehouse was dark and the moon, while not full, was big and bright enough to light his way to the staircase leading to the loft so he could sit on one of the steps and look out. It’s maybe one of the only things he missed from his life in Pennsylvania. At night you could arch your back and stare up as far as the eye could see and there was never an end to the abundance of stars in the sky. Even when it was supposed to storm, with clouds plowing through carrying rain or snow, the stars still stretched across the sky.

Maddie used to take him out in the middle of the night during the first snowfall of the year. She’d bundle him in his oversized puffy snow suit and shove two pairs of socks on his feet and carry him outside so that they could spin around until their noses were so cold they couldn’t feel them anymore. Then they’d wedge themselves in pockets of thick snow and stare up at the sky and Buck would get lost between stars and snowflakes. The lost feeling used to be a comfort because he knew if he turned one way or the other there’d be light to guide him.

Now he was suffocating in it.

_Plastic and fear strangled him as he desperately clawed at the clear wrap twisted around his face._

Now he wasn’t able to catch his breath and when he looked up at the sky he saw nothing.

Nothing.

_He drifted away before he even realized he’d let go and the world of pain and terror was dark but oh, the stars. The stars were back. He flew through them like Wendy Darling flew to Neverland for the first time. Floating and a little scared but too hurt to look back. Maddie used to read him Peter Pan. Maddie._

Buck squeezed his eyes shut as he forced himself to take a deep, slow breath. The bruising on his neck and face weren’t as prominent as they had been when he’d first gotten out of the hospital but the mottled yellow and green marks still felt like they were burning against his skin every time he had to remind himself to just breathe.

_“Come on, Buck!” Eddie, he thinks, demanded. “Breathe! Breathe Buck!”_

And then as if summoned by the siren song of Buck’s misery, there was Eddie. Stable, solid Eddie rumpled from sleep with an adorable tuft of hair out of place from a pillow. 

“I thought you told Bobby you would sleep if he let you stay on for the twenty-four hours,” Eddie said as he climbed the stairs.

“I did.” Buck quirked his lips into a twitch of a smile but it stayed twisted into something forced instead.

Eddie hummed and dragged a hand through Buck’s hair before his fingers tapped the underside of Buck’s jaw.

“You know you have to be in bed to sleep?”

“Not true. I can actually sleep anywhere.”

“Oh,” Eddie said with a huff of a laugh. “I see. So, you decided to sleep on the stairs for preparation?”

“Exactly.”

And that would be the story Buck would sell to Bobby if he was caught. Because he hadn’t been. Sleeping that is. Not really. Most nights ended with him clinging to Eddie in his sleep as a nightmare plowed through his brain or had him gasping awake like he couldn’t breathe again after a sharp _click_ sent him flying.

_The hammer snapped against metal as the gun jerked behind his head but the sound Athena made was even louder._

One eventful night even had him turning up at Maddie’s gulping for air and crying in a way that borderline hysterical. There was a real possibility Buck was going to have to give up his apartment but he wasn’t ready for that yet. He wasn’t ready to let go and give up. Buck had turned a little desperate and it was pathetic but he was trying. He really was.

Eddie slid in behind Buck and let the blond lean his weight back into his lap. Strong arms curled around Buck’s shoulder and soft lips pressed a tight kiss against his temple.

_“Do not even think of making a sound,” she’d hissed as she held the gun to his temple. But Maddie kept knocking and calling for him._

_“Please,” Buck had tried but she cut him with a sharp glare._

_Maddie was still knocking._

_“Please,” Buck tried again. “I can make her leave. It’s just my sister. Please. She’ll leave.”_

Buck clasped his hand on Eddie’s forearm and let himself bask in the quiet moment where he just allowed himself to be held by his boyfriend.

“What’s going on, Buck?” Why do you look like you’re lost in the constellations?” Eddie’s lips moved against the skin of the knot of Buck’s jaw and Buck shivered against the soft touch.

_Buck’s head bounced back on his neck with the first punch but the hand on the front of his shirt was the only thing that kept him from falling backward with a crack against the tile._

He hated how he braced for impact now. Hated how his skin was programed to tense at the slightest touch. But Eddie didn’t handle him like porcelain. Eddie was always so soft and gentle and firm and there. He touched Buck the same way he touched him before. He moved in his space the same way he did before Buck had turned blue. Eddie was the same even if Buck wasn’t. He was trying to be but… it was hard.

Another kiss pressed against the point where his brow bone sloped around his eye and he relaxed a little.

“Talk to me, Buck,” Eddie said.

_“You should feel lucky that I picked him.”_

“Why does everyone think I’m damaged?”

Buck felt Eddie’s body exhale before the hot rush of air of his sigh caressed Buck’s skin.

“Buck---"

“Abby, Ali, Jocelyn, that woman. They all saw it.” Buck shrugged. “Even Bobby saw it at one point. I don’t…. I don’t understand and I try so hard---”

“Buck.” Eddie tightened his hold on him. “You are not damaged.”

“I---”

But then Eddie’s hand curled under his jaw and turned his head so he could see Eddie’s face.

“You are not damaged.”

And it would be so easy to believe him. It was easy to believe that Eddie believed that. This wasn’t the first time they’d had a conversation like this. Buck always left them feeling a little better and a little… well, a little worse. Eddie’s hand brushed away from the hinge of his jaw and cupped his cheek as he leaned over to pepper small kisses against Buck’s face as if they would make it true.

_“No one will miss him.”_

But Buck wasn’t in the mood to feel better. He wanted to sit in the wallow a little more because there had to be a reason.

“Fine,” Buck said even as Eddie kissed up along his cheek bone. “If I’m not damaged then… I’m jagged.”

Eddie pulled back and gave him a frown.

“What?”

Buck sighed and curled away from the warmth of Eddie’s arms.

“I’m jagged. I’m not straight.”

“Yes, I’m aware,” Eddie said dryly whenever he thought Buck was being ridiculous and he was indulging him.

“I just mean…” Buck rubbed a hand at the back of his head where the phantom of the ricochet still tingled against his scalp. “People get caught on me and they get hurt.”

“You’re being ridiculous.” And there it was.

“No,” Buck said with a flare of annoyance rushing through him. “I’m not, Eddie!”

Buck pulled himself until he was on the other side of the step and curled his arms around his knees as he desperately tried to look out the window for the stars he couldn’t see. It was barely six inches between him and Eddie but it felt like an ocean’s worth and Eddie didn’t chase after him. Eddie didn’t chase which wasn’t a bad thing if you chose to stop running. But Buck was always running.

Running from home. Running from the pain of betrayal. Running towards something that would flare something in him that made him feel alive.

“Buck,” Eddie said as the sound of his hand rubbing against his stubbled face sounded like sandpaper over the thunder of Buck’s heart. “Buck, look, I’m not going to have the conversation you should be having with Athena with you. Because it won’t matter how many times I tell you or Maddie or whoever does that what happened to you and Athena wasn’t your fault. That woman---”

Buck could practically hear Eddie grind at the anger that took over when he remembered Ellie Costas.

“That family have been blaming everyone else for their problems when they should’ve been doing some serious self-reflecting. They used you to get to Bobby and Athena. Not because of some pathetic justification but because it would hurt them. They care about you. Because you’re family and she thought because Bobby and Athena took away her family that they don’t get to have one with you either.”

The hot press of tears stung at Buck’s eyes, the ones that he’d so desperately tried to outrun by coming out here in the first place, and was hard to control. A few slipped out anyway and Eddie’s hand reached out to brush them away with a knuckle.

Because that was Eddie. Rough and volatile and callous and harsh but also so gentle and so soft and perfect in all the ways Buck wasn’t.

But Buck was desperate, maybe he’d always been, and he leaned until he could trap the hand with his face and his shoulder.

_Collateral damage she had said in the same tone as her son that horrible night._

“She said I was broken,” Buck said in barely a whisper.

“She was wrong.” Eddie leaned until he could press his forehead against Buck’s temple and inhaled the scent of Buck’s shampoo. The nuzzle was enough for Buck to unclench from his ball and lean into the strength of Eddie’s arms that were quick to circle around him again.

“You’re whole,” Eddie said into his hair. “She was the broken one. Not you.”

And Buck tried to believe him. Eddie took his silence as reassurance because they spent the better part of forty minutes of just nuzzling against each other until they were breathing in the same synchronicity that tied both of them together in almost all aspects of their lives. But the bruises on his face, on his wrists, in his brain still felt like massive craters.

_He was going to die. He was going to die and the last thing Maddie was going to remember him by was_ that. _That moment where Buck said horrible things to his sister that made her cry with a gun pressed in between his ribs. He dropped his forehead to rest against the door, miserable but also so freaking relieved because he got Maddie to leave, and didn’t even care that the gun ended up wedged harder against his side._

_“Move,” she said with a nudge of the gun._

_Buck hesitated for one brief moment of defiance because he so easily could run after Maddie and beg her forgiveness and he didn’t care if the crazy lady shot him in the process. But then he did as he was told, lifting his hands as he stepped away from the door, and turned his back to his retreating sister._

_He hoped she understood what he’d been trying to say. The woman didn’t seem to catch any of his hints. But Maddie had been so upset by the end of it that if by the time she figured out anything was wrong; Buck would already be dead. Because he was going to die. That much was painfully obvious now in the way only true clarity could hurt. There wasn’t anything he could do to change it._

_Other than protect his sister._

_“Face down on the floor and put your hands behind your back,” she instructed._

_It wasn’t until Buck’s face met cold tile that he even realized he was crying. The small huffing sounds were escaping like little plumes of hot breath from his lips against the cold floor. The sound of the zip tie pulling tight against his already bruising wrists was like a record scratch and the weight of the woman on his back was almost as suffocating as the rag she pulled between his teeth and taunt against his cheeks._

_God, Maddie._

“It’s interesting,” Frank said with a rub of his thumb against his upper lip. “That the moment you seemed almost hyper fixated on is the moment where you saved Maddie from coming into the apartment.”

Buck shrugged as he tried to massage out the tension of the joint where his thumb met palm. It’d been aching for days.

“I guess it’s just when I gave up.”

“It’s the moment you knew you were supposed to die,” Frank repeated back to him and Buck nodded. “But why then? Why not when you first woke up to a strange woman in your apartment or even the hours leading up to that?”

Because he had hurt her. Buck didn’t say that out loud. He wasn’t brave enough to vocalize that defeat quite yet. But he had. Even if it’d been to protect her, he couldn’t get that betrayed flash of hurt that’d crossed her face out of his head. It was kind of ironic how he’d spent all his life desperately clinging to her, begging her not to leave him, and he’d been the one who’d been forced to take an axe to that line and sever it.

“Is it, perhaps,” Frank said, trying to lead Buck out of his head again. “That because Maddie serves as kind of a safe place for you, the moment you denied yourself that safety it became real?”

Buck shrugged again and pushed harder into the joint of his thumb, his nail leaving a little indent in the skin as he tried to squeeze out the ache.

“Maddie’s always been my big sister.”

“Yes, but has she always been there?”

Buck frowned. “No, but she---”

Frank held up a hand. “I know, Buck, I know. But bear with me here and just answer the question. Has Maddie always been there when you needed her?”

Buck felt a curl of irritation flicker in his chest.

“No.”

She hadn’t been. She had been once upon a time. Back when he’d been a shy kid who hid against her neck and thought the sun and moon rose and fell with Maddie.

“But even when she wasn’t there, when she was with her ex-husband and not speaking to you, was she always your safe space?”

Buck bit down on his lip.

Maddie in the sundresses. Maddie in the snow. Maddie adjusting his bow tie when he’d been all limbs and had to stand in front of a bunch of people at her wedding. Maddie wiping his tears when he’d come home from school after being teased for his birth mark. Maddie coming home when Buck called her because their parents were three days late from coming back from their cruise and Buck had worked himself up into thinking they’d died or something.

The memories of Maddie had been just as present as the real thing. A constant in his life even when she wasn’t around. Like the time he’d walked back to his dorm in the middle of the night crying because he couldn’t remember anything but laughter that sounded too harsh in his ears when he woke up on the floor of someone else’s bedroom. Or like the time he’d taken his first step off the plane in South America with no plan. Or like when Bobby had told him to clear out his locker and he’d been left in an empty station with his heart in his throat.

At least he had Maddie. Even when he didn’t have her, he had her memory.

Buck nodded when the silence stretched out a little too long.

“Yeah.”

“So then,” Frank said as if he wasn’t having to drag every response out of Buck like he was stuck in quicksand. “Is it possible, that the reason your nightmares seem so fixated on that moment when you closed the door on your sister is because you were closing off to that safe feeling you get when it comes to Maddie?”

Buck’s frowned deepened until his mouth started to hurt. “I don’t understand.”

But Frank didn’t seem bothered by the fact that Buck was so lost he was dizzy.

“You went through a pretty extreme trauma, Buck. But it’s not the trauma that’s haunting you. It’s the inability to allow yourself to feel safe again.”

“So, you’re saying my brain or subconscious or whatever is just mocking me.”

“I’m saying your brain or subconscious or whatever,” Frank said with a huff of a laugh. “Is trying to tell you what you need.”

Stupidly, that almost made Buck start crying again and he bit back down on his lip so hard that he could focus on that pain rather than the press behind his eyes. Because it was true and to have someone else point it out made Buck feel more exposed than he liked to admit.

Desperate.

That’s all he could manage whenever he tried to put into words how he felt day in and day out.

“I know you struggle with feeling like you’re being too dependent on others,” Frank started.

_Honestly, Evan, you need to grow out of this clinginess. No one’s ever going to want someone so desperate._

Buck winced at the word but Frank either didn’t notice or didn’t think it was worth mentioning.

“But we’re all entitled to feeling supported and loved,” Frank carried on.

Buck hid his face in the curve of his hand, rubbing hard against his eyes before his hand travelled up the slope of his forehead into his hair.

_“It’ll all be over soon,” she said, her long fingers petting his hair one last time before the rattle of his door handle cued the replacing of her caress with a hard press of gun metal against his skull._

_“I have a gun to his head.”_

Buck’s fingers knotted in his hair and he leaned into the pain a little before letting go and dropping his hand to bounce on the fabric of the armchair.

“We’ve talked a little about your tendency to self-isolate,” Frank said after watching the action and reminding Buck that he was being very closely watched even if Frank was good at hiding it.

“Have you talked to Maddie about what happened? About what it was like on the other side of that door?”

Buck’s throat was dry and the effort to open his mouth was turning monumental. He shook his head. He’d blurted out an apology, half out of his mind with pain and the other half consumed by panic. It was like gasping for breath when a wave of water pummeled your body and sent you sailing. The moment you break the surface is the moment you scramble to take another before the opportunity is lost. Buck had thought he would never get to explain to Maddie and waking up to the sound of her voice had been like breaking the surface with water still rushing around him.

“What about Sergeant Grant?” Frank asked. “Speaking with someone who also went through a trauma with you might benefit you both. Have you spoken with her?”

Buck shook his head again.

“Athena…” Buck’s voice croaked on the sound of her name in his ears. “She wouldn’t want to see me.”

Frank tilted his head.

“How can you be so sure?” When Buck didn’t answer again, Frank shifted in his seat and pressed. “Buck? Did she say she didn’t want to see you?”

_“Buck,” Athena breathed out his name like a prayer._

_The heat of her hand was so close to his that he could almost feel her._

_“’Thena,” he said because she would understand what was happening. “I-I don’t---”_

_The collar of his shirt pulled tight against his throat as he was dragged away._

The summer weather always seemed to make Maddie glow. Despite her insistence that Fall was her favorite season, Maddie always seemed to thrive under the hot sun and suffocating heat.

Unlike Buck, who couldn’t hold a tan if he tried because his skin always turned a little pink from overheating and his hair crisped into the right amount of frizzy for his curls to go wild on his head. But when Maddie had turned up at his doorstep in one of those long-forgotten sundresses that showed off the freckles on her shoulders and gathered around her ankles, Buck had been too taken with nostalgia to argue when she insisted on lunch outside at a nearby park.

It was kind of surreal, being faced with something he’d been thinking a lot about without realizing it. Maddie’s sundresses had been on his mind since before… Well… Before. Seeing her in another one, wearing the linen fabric like it was a comfortable second skin as it billowed with the small breeze, was like being hugged after forgetting what a hug felt like.

This one was a long navy color with white embroidered flowers sprinkled along the skirt like the night sky in the middle of winter.

“I’m sorry, Maddie,” Buck said, so quiet it almost got lost in the breeze that whistled past their picnic table. “I’m sorry for everything.”

“You have nothing to be sorry for,” Maddie insisted as she covered his hand with her own.

_“I-I-I didn’t mean any of it. I’m so sorry. Maddie. I-I d-didn’t--- I had to get you to leave. She-she-she was behind the door and I-I’m sorry. I’m sorry.”_

Buck shook his head but Maddie was just as stubborn as he was. Chimney had learned first-hand that first Christmas the might of the Buckley stubbornness when Maddie and Buck had started to argue about nothing. The fight had started about Christmas and whirlpooled into nowhere that ended with neither of them speaking to one another until the next morning when Buck had offered Maddie coffee as a truce.

It’d been their first real big blow out since Maddie had come back into his life. A part of Buck had expected it. That was always what happened.

_“Please, Maddie,” Evan had said, stuffed in a tuxedo and trying not to hate Maddie in her oversized ballgown that was too grown up and too concealing from the sundresses she used to always wear._

_He lifted his gaze from his shoes and tried not to wince at her almost annoyed pinched expression._

_“Please don’t marry him.”_

Buck couldn’t help but feel like they were heading straight for one. He stared down at his half eaten sandwiched, the crust worried away by his fingers, and hoped that he’d veered course before collision.

“I’m the one who should be sorry,” Maddie said and Buck jerked at that because Maddie never said she was sorry.

She said ‘I love you’ and she dished out assurances but apologies were never a thing. Maybe it was because she’d spent so much time apologizing for things that weren’t her fault or maybe it was because Buck gave her a pass every time he deserved one to the point that he no longer even thought to expect one. Maybe it was both.

Maddie sucked in a shake breath and held his gaze. “I’m sorry, Evan. For everything. For not being there. For not letting you grieve. For not listening to you. All of it.”

A single tear slipped down her cheek and she pinched her lips together to brush it away with her hand and Buck hated it. He never could stand it when Maddie cried. When he’d been younger, he used to start wailing whenever Maddie so much as sniffled.

“N-no, Maddie,” Buck said, squeezing her hand back. “You have nothing to be sorry for.”

Even as he said it the words floated into his subconscious.

_Not true._

But Buck had gotten used to shoving that voice back into the deep, dark parts of his brain that he never visited.

“Look,” Buck pressed. “Those things I said… I knew they would hurt. I was _trying_ to hurt you. She was standing behind the door and I knew I needed to get you to leave and I was just saying those things.”

_“Maddie, I wouldn’t remember what your help looked like if it fell on top of me.”_

Maddie’s gaze steeled and she shook her head again.

“They hurt, Buck, because they were true,” Maddie said not unkindly. “You are one of the most kind, selfless, reliable people I know. And somewhere along the way I took advantage of that.”

“No, no, Maddie,” Buck tried. “Listen. You’re my safe place. Okay? I never questioned that you love me. Never.”

Maddie smiled. The heat amplified in Buck’s face as he blushed over the very obvious language Frank had been drilling into his head but he needed Maddie to know.

“Yeah, but Buck… you weren’t wrong either.”

Maddie held up a hand when Buck opened his mouth to speak.

“No, now you listen.” She waited as she watched Buck squirm until he swallowed the impulse to brush the rawness of their relationship under the rug again. “You were right. I do expect you to pick up my baggage when I drop it at your feet. I became dependent on that actually.”

“Yeah, but I want to Maddie,” Buck argued.

Maddie nodded.

“I know.”

_“No one will miss him.”_

Buck’s hands started to shake and under Maddie’s small petite ones, they must have felt like another earthquake in the palm of her hands. But she held him tight, unwavering, and so sure.

“But I want you to know that I will always be there to pick up yours too,” she said. “Okay? There’s no other place in this world I would rather be than standing between you and anyone who thinks they can hurt you. Even when it’s me.”

Maddie lifted a pinky finger in the air--the sacred Buckley oath that always made them roll their eyes--- and smiled when Buck’s wrapped around hers.

“I will always be on your team. You will always be my safe place,” Maddie vowed and squeezed her finger around Buck’s when he did roll her eyes. “And I will always be yours.”

_“You don’t remember me, do you?”_

_The sound of her voice startled Buck because it was the first thing she’d said to him after hours since she took out the rag from his mouth that he'd woken up with and had dried his throat out and last said, “Make a noise and I’ll put this back on.”_

_Buck frowned and twisted his hands against the hard plastic restraints._

_“Uh, sure?” He cleared his throat and nodded his head. “Of course, I do.”_

_No, he didn’t. But ever since he woke up with his face pressed to the floor of his apartment and a crazy woman with a gun who kept pacing while she periodically checked his phone, Buck had been playing a game of catch up that he was getting further and further behind in._

_The woman arched a brow and shook her head. “No, you don’t. That’s okay.”_

_She pressed the toe of her shoe above the ankle of his bad leg, pushing down on the long pale pink scar on his skin._

_“By the time I saw you on the ground, I’m pretty sure you were unconscious.”_

The problem is, Buck--- despite, nine out of ten times promising he would never do it again--- gets comfortable after a while. The time when he’s used to the way things were and the way he exists eventually pushes down the desperation and replaces that with complacency.

Frank had been trying very hard to get Buck to see the difference between contentment and complacency but it’d been an uphill battle from the start.

Insecurity had a way of jabbing you in the ribs if it felt like it was forgotten.

Over time, the bruising faded until you almost couldn’t see the outlines unless you were particularly looking for them. Buck was sleeping through the night more frequently and the nightmares of shutting the door on Maddie dwindled. The serenity of his muscle memory kicking in at his job was enough to turn the ache in his muscles from pain into work.

Everyone eventually stopped treating him like cracked glass.

He got comfortable again.

And like always, he ruined it by running his mouth.

“You going to be there, Buckaroo?” Hen asked, breathless from her laughter that had been infectious to the rest of the team.

“Where?”

“The first summer barbecue!” Chim crowed as he always did when it came to their traditional gatherings.

“I’m making my endless ribs,” Bobby said from within the fridge as he pulled out ingredients for their lunch.

The barbecue used to be Buck’s favorite. It always felt like the beginning of a new year; like the turning of a page into a new chapter.

He shook his head, suddenly feeling raw and scratched again. He didn’t even think about how he was going to have to miss it.

“Nah,” Buck said with a pained smile because he was all too aware how everyone on his team was suddenly watching him like he was one misstep from shattering again.

Suddenly, the waves that rippled between them fell flat with the humorous vibe and that desperation clawed at the back of his throat.

“Why not?” Hen asked.

“Yeah, you love first summer barbecue!” Chim added like the duet they often teamed up as.

Buck thumbed his birthmark as his stomach flipped at the sudden damp mood and shrugged.

“I’ve got a… thing.” Even to his own ears it sounded stupid and Buck winced at the unimpressed expressions directed at him like a firing squad.

“A thing?”

Chimney’s hand itched at his side like he was one stuttering word away from texting Maddie and tattling on Buck to his older sister.

Buck shot him an irritated glare and took over pulling off the grapes from their stems for the fruit salad Bobby had put him in charge of.

“Yeah, a thing.”

Chimney lifted his hand in surrender and turned to go set the table with Hen on his heel.

“What’s this thing that’s stopping you from eating your weight in BBQ sauce?” Bobby asked, his voice level but fishing all the same.

Buck cut a glance at Eddie who was unhelpfully being helpful to someone else downstairs. That was the problem with everyone knowing they were dating now. Buck couldn’t even use his boyfriend as an excuse because Eddie would be there.

“It’s nothing,” Buck said without looking up at Bobby. “I’m sorry. I’m being stupid. It’s fine. Athena probably doesn’t even want me around. I’ll just---”

“Whoa!” Bobby rescued the fruit from the abuse at Buck’s hands before he turned Buck to face him with a push on his shoulder. “Buck! What makes you think Athena doesn’t want you around?”

Buck thumbed at his birthmark again before he twisted his fingers into the harsh tangle of his hair.

“C’mon, Bobby.”

Please don’t make him say it. Please don’t make him say it. Denial was his only life raft in the sea of desperation that threatened to drown him again.

_“I picked the broken thing for a necessary evil.”_

He’d been doing so well and it was like he was back there all over again. Buck shook his head and latched his teeth onto his lip to keep from saying anything else stupid. But Bobby had that urgent kind of also disappointed expression on his face and Buck couldn’t look at him. The hot flush of embarrassment rushed into his face until he was dizzy with it.

Bobby’s hand on his shoulder was a solid anchor and the desperate part of Buck wanted to cling to it until the world stopped spinning.

But Buck shook his head again and tried to pull away.

“No, you come on.” Bobby bodily pushed himself in front of Buck and blocked him from view of Hen and Chim who were openly watching them. “What’s going on in that big head of yours?”

Bobby’s voice was pitched low and lulled some of the swarming buzzing that roared to life in Buck’s ears.

_Please don’t make me say it. Please don’t make me say it._

_“I told you to be quiet.”_

Buck flinched under the balmy sound of Bobby’s voice but that was the thing about Bobby. The low timber of his voice was as soothing as a lullaby but so steady when you needed it. It’s what made him one of the greats. It had a way of breaking through the agony and panic so that you listened.

But that horrible desperate part of him that he hated so much, the one that wanted to cling to anyone who showed him one ounce of attention, was ripping him to shreds because if he had to say it then Bobby would hate him and he could take away Buck’s job again and everything he had was there and---

The loft was suddenly empty and Buck was stuck under the heavy gaze of Bobby’s concerned eyes and he knew Bobby would wait an eternity if Buck made him.

Buck shrugged and pointedly looked down at the shredded remains of the lunch that wasn’t being cooked.

“It’s my fault. I know that---”

“Hey!” Suddenly, Bobby’s other hand was on Buck’s other shoulder and Buck hadn’t felt so steady in a while. “Look at me, Buck.”

Buck didn’t want to. Bobby was too intense and Buck was too exposed that it would be like willingly putting your hand over an open flame and waiting for it to burn. But again, Bobby’s patience could rival a saint’s and he ducked down until Buck met his gaze again.

“None of what happened was your fault. None of it.”

Buck wanted to believe him. Wanted to believe him just like he wanted to believe Eddie and Frank and Maddie and everyone else who had been repeating the same thing over and over again. But he couldn’t.

“Yeah, but if I’d done something… Athena wouldn’t have been in that room.”

Bobby’s expression flickered with a flash of pain before he could hide it but Buck saw anyway. But the truth wasn’t something that people could wash away with kind words and platitudes. He didn’t understand why everyone was fighting him on that but it didn’t change the facts.

She used Buck’s phone, Buck’s apartment, and Buck to get to Athena and ultimately to Bobby.

_“It’ll all be over soon.” She cooed as Buck whimpered on the floor as the hurt radiated across his body after a supernova of punches. “It won’t hurt for much longer.”_

“I don’t even know how you can stand to look at me, Bobby,” Buck confessed, the words stealing what was left of the air in his lungs.

“Buck,” Bobby said his name like he'd sucker punched him in the gut.

And Buck… he could’ve gone his whole life never hearing the way Bobby said his name the way he just did. He was used to the tired, exasperated sigh of Evan on his parents’ lips. The annoyed, impatient hiss of Evan. The sharp pop of Buck when he was being particularly stupid.

But Bobby choked on it. Like slamming your hand against a window that didn’t break and reverberated in the frame with a hollow thundering.

Bobby hung his head and Buck braced himself for the inevitable.

Bobby pulled him into his arms and hugged him. Tight.

Buck didn’t even understand what was happening and his confusion must have rippled off him in waves because Bobby only held on tighter.

“Ellie Costas went into your apartment to kill you. That was her ultimate goal. She wanted you dead.” Bobby’s breath was hot against his face which was a stark contrast from the freezing cold that shot down Buck’s spine at his frankness. “She was going to kill you and then she was going to kill my wife because of me. If anyone is to blame, it’s me.”

_“I’m going to make you watch as I kill him and then I’m going to kill you and wait until Captain Nash finds your bodies.”_

“Bobby… no…”

Bobby pulled Buck away but didn’t let him go far because his hands landed back on Buck’s shoulders and he held Buck’s gaze with a stern, unwavering vulnerability.

“Two very important people in my life could’ve died and by some miracle they didn’t.”

Bobby blinked as his lip gave a tiny quiver before his face stiffened again.

“But no one, and I mean no one, Buck, blames you for what happened.”

“But ‘Thena…” Buck couldn’t even bring himself to say it.

Bobby shook his head.

“She would’ve run in there no matter who would have tried to stop her,” he said with a rueful smile. “She would’ve _sprinted_ in for you.”

_“Are you sure about this?”_

_“Yes. Just get it done. I need him to make a point.”_

_Buck didn’t even get a chance to back up before a hand snatched the front of his collar and lifted him high enough for a solid, hard punch to land squarely against his face. His head snapped back into the shattering wavelength of a ringing only Buck could hear. Another punch followed by another._

_And then another._

_Another._

_A kick_

_A drag._

_Crying._

_Another punch._

_Eons, it felt like Buck was laying beneath the assault of a hail storm as boulders of ice rained down on him._

_And when it was over… he was left on the ground to stare up at the spots of snow and stars dancing along his vision._

_“That’s enough.” Rustling and then, “Here.”_

_“Nah, you keep it. Call it even for the favor I owed Victor.”_

The thing about going through a trauma--- Frank somehow managed to contain his victory dance to a simple quirk of his lips when Buck finally said the t-word--- where a crazy woman breaks into your house and tries to kill you is that the rest of the shit that’d been going on in Buck’s life kind of wasted away into the land of forgetfulness.

The bruises were gone and his burn on his arm had healed to a very thin snake of dry skin. The confidence that tempered Buck’s deepest insecurities made a brave albeit late return. Eddie could slide up behind him and pepper a kiss on his neck without having to wait for Buck to ease out of the immediate instinct to brace. He slept through most of the night without gasping for air like he’d never tasted oxygen in his lungs before. He didn’t tiptoe around his friends when they got too loud or too quiet (silence had always been just as bad as explosive, in Buck’s experience.)

Overall, Buck was getting comfortable with being comfortable. The desperation that had consumed every nerve ending in his body was still there but not nearly as loud now that Buck had a steady grasp of what it was like to be normal.

He missed being normal.

He wanted to be normal again.

_“You were never normal,” Eddie whispered against Buck’s sweat, silky skin. “You’ve always been extraordinary.”_

Among other things that made Buck blush if he thought too long about them while in public.

But, the nervousness of the upcoming barbecue puckered beneath Buck’s skin until a restlessness he couldn’t shake took over. He wasn’t avoiding going to Bobby’s house. Hen, had all but threatened to come drag Buck to the party if he even thought about skipping out. Everyone vetoed Buck essentially have a choice in the matter.

Which he would’ve been annoyed about except his friends had done _nothing but_ remind him over and over again how he had a choice in everything. It’d been like the Costas family had done everything they could to make sure everyone hurt as much as they did and they didn’t give Buck a choice about whether he wanted to be involved or not. So, his team, as they often did, overcompensated.

But… it was time.

Buck knew that. That didn’t make the anxiety of knowing that go away.

Which is why Buck was standing in the middle of the grocery store and taking in a rather sad display of premade pastries. Despite, what Maddie thought, Buck did listen when she told him basic civilized things like how it was polite to bring something when going to a party where food was involved. And he wanted it to go right. If that meant he had to hide behind some clearance pumpkin pie then so be it.

But the problem with planning on not going to a party and then being talked---threatened— into going meant that Buck didn’t exactly have a lot of time to find perfection. Which left him with his sad table with sad pastries and sad choices.

Buck picked up a box of over glazed--- and why did they look wet--- cinnamon rolls when he heard it.

The gasp of his name. Not Buck but---

“Evan.”

Like an exclamation that was said out of question.

Buck stilled. His heels rooted to the floor and kept him frozen in his place despite every urge in his body begging him to move.

But the ground shifted a little instead and his head was spinning as his stomach twisted into something sharp and painful.

_Do people even send cards anymore?_

Jocelyn looked out of place without her scrubs. She looked ordinary and so wrong at the same time with her hair pinned up to her head by a claw clip and her mom jeans belted around her waist.

There’d been a time when Buck had taken an enormous amount of comfort from the sight of her for granted. Now, he was just stuck sinking in the realization that the comfort had soured into something more wary.

Cold sweat cooled in the small of his back and the logical part of his brain recognized that it was unfair to associate Jocelyn with someone like Ellie Costas. They’d both snuck up on Buck in their own ways and ambushed his life without giving him a single choice in the matter. But unlike Ellie, Jocelyn had good yet misguided intentions.

That didn’t mean he wanted to see her ever again.

Something close to a sting punctured a space in Buck’s heart and grew in its sharpness.

_Oh well._

_Didn’t work out._

_You wouldn’t need me anyway._

_You’re an adult._

“Evan,” Jocelyn said again when Buck’s silence started to drown them. “I’m so glad I ran into you. I heard---”

She reached for him and Buck shied away, clutching the cinnamon rolls close to his body. Jocelyn stopped, her hand outstretched and empty, before she dropped it back down to her side.

She cleared her throat like it would somehow break the tense taffy like awkwardness that had spun around them but it only made it worse.

“I heard what happened.”

So had Buck. Or at least, he’d heard about Maddie tearing her to shreds in the middle of the hospital lobby in front of a bunch of people and then reporting her.

But Jocelyn was probably talking about the attack.

“Yeah,” Buck said because he didn’t know what else to say.

The sting that started in his chest slithered into cold tendrils through his veins until his fingers felt numb.

_“Collateral damage.”_

_“… he’s already damaged.”_

_“No one will miss him.”_

_“I tried, Evan, but it just didn’t work out. You wouldn’t need me anyway. You’re an adult.”_

Eddie had said Buck wasn’t broken but maybe he was wrong. Jocelyn didn’t even know him and she felt so bad for him that she pretended to be his mom.

_Xx Mom_

God, was he so pathetic that some stranger could see how desperate he was for one scrap of affection?

“What are you doing here?” Buck asked when Jocelyn just kept staring at him.

“I… I knew this was your grocery store you preferred and I…” She broke out in a watery smile. “I just want to see how you were doing.”

Suddenly, Buck couldn’t breathe and the phantom weight of the gun against his skull was the only thing keeping him from moving. She’d been watching him?

“Evan, please,” Jocelyn said, her eyes pinched with worry as Buck felt the lightheadedness that buzzed across his skin to warn him that he was starting to hyperventilating.

“I just wanted to talk.”

It hurt. It _hurt._

_He hurt and he was stuck in the molasses of shock and pain that kept him nailed to the floor. The gun against his skull was nothing compared to the burning, suffocating pressure of the plastic over his face as he gasped for any air at all._

_Athena… he was going to get Athena killed. He hadn’t been careful and she’d been watching him and Athena was choking on his name as she reached out to him and---_

“You have some nerve.” Buck would recognize that voice anywhere.

Athena stepped in front of Buck and held out her hand to stop Jocelyn from getting any closer in a blink of an eye and it was only because he’d been gripping the box tight that he didn’t drop the cinnamon rolls to the floor.

Jocelyn’s expression went from soft to a hard frustration just as fast.

“I’m only trying---”

“I believe his sister told you that you were never to speak to Buck again.” Athena cut her off with a sharp click of her teeth.

“That’s for him to decide. He’s an adult,” Jocelyn argued.

Silence blanketed them as Athena and Jocelyn locked in for a standstill while Buck was just trying to take a full deep breath after what felt like a lifetime. But Athena’s back was straight and unwavering. He couldn’t really believe it. He’d spent so long avoiding her that seeing her in front of him, all fierce protectiveness and stern authority shielding him from Jocelyn, was unreal. Buck towered over Athena but he could’ve been all of four feet tall as he cowered behind her.

Jocelyn’s glare cut from Athena up to Buck again.

“I-I d-don’t want to talk to you, Jocelyn.”

“Evan,” she said, his name like a sigh of annoyance on her lips that made him flinch.

Athena couldn’t have seen it but she braced herself like she’d felt it deep in her bones.

_“I hate how my mom says my name. Like.. I’ve already annoyed her before I’ve even said anything.”_

“That’s enough,” Athena said. “He says he doesn’t want to talk to you. You can’t force him to and if you’re lucky, Buck here won’t file a restraining order against you with a firm no contact clause in place.”

Jocelyn’s glare sharpened until she was almost unrecognizable. “You can’t arrest me for running into someone at a grocery store.”

“Wanna bet?”

Silence bubbled around them in one pressurized moment where Buck wasn’t sure what was going to happen next or who was going to break first.

It was Jocelyn. She cut a glance up at Buck, her expression pulled down into a frown of something close to hurt and disappointment --- Buck refused to admit that added to the earlier sting that was still pulsing in his chest like a fresh brush--- before she turned on her heel and left.

Athena stayed rooted to the spot in front of Buck where she watched Jocelyn retreat from the store and into her car before driving away. They watched through the big bay windows of the store as Jocelyn’s taillights turned out of the parking lot and disappeared into the steady LA traffic.

Athena turned on her heel and looked up at Buck who felt a little stupid at the way his hands were starting to shake.

“Uh…” Buck said, when he couldn’t think of what to say. “This isn’t what it looks like.”

Athena’s brow arched high on her forehead, thoroughly unimpressed.

“It looks like you’re planning on buying two-day old pastries to bring to a party I’m fairly certain my husband told you not to worry about.”

And… Buck exhaled a shaky laugh.

“That’s… Okay, it’s exactly what it looks like.”

Athena freed the ruined box from Buck’s hands and Buck curled his hands into fists to hide the tremble in his fingers.

“Are you okay, Buckaroo?”

It… And… Buck was not going to cry in the middle of a grocery store. He wasn’t. But seeing Athena in front of him, there and solid and the same as she’d always been nearly broke him right there in the middle of the store bakery. It was too much, too fast.

It was all just too much. Too much at once all flooding in until he was drowning in desperation to grab onto her and never let go but he was too scared to do it again. Too raw. Too unprepared.

“Yeah,” he said, his voice strangled in the mess of his throat. “I’m going… I’m gonna go. I’ll see--- Bye!”

“Buck---” Athena called and she sounded heartbroken and Buck hated that he’d been the cause of it but he needed space or something or just anything because he thought he had time to prepare and suddenly she was just there. She was always there.

No one had ever been there when he needed them. Except Athena.

_“Everything else, your parents, your phone, everything, we’ll figure out later.”_

_“We?”_

_“I’m going to help you make sure your parents are so impressed that complicated won’t even be in your vocabulary the next time you see them.”_

Getting to back to his apartment was a bit of a blur and it should’ve been a little alarming that he couldn't even really remember getting in his car let alone driving home, but Buck was too tired to care. He was too exhausted to care. The desperation he’d been dragging around like it’d been chained at his feet had sapped the energy from every inch of his body until all he could do was curl up on his bed and hide under his covers.

No… that wasn’t the right word.

Seeing Jocelyn and then Athena had been different. It was like that moment you break the surface of the speeding water. The first initial inhale as your face breaks free. Like looking up at a sky of stars and snow and breathing in that first cold, magical crisp of air.

Overwhelmed. He was overwhelmed. Overwhelmed until the desperation almost extinguished from his thoughts and forced the tears he’d so trying forever to hold back out.

At some point, Eddie’s warm arms slipped around him as the bed dipped and Buck curled against him and cried. Soft, quivering tears that had been begging to be let go for weeks now.

They stayed like that for what felt like hours and rough, harsh Eddie let him cry it out while he nuzzled into Buck’s hair.

Eventually, the sound of Eddie’s heartbeat overpowered the ringing in Buck’s ears.

“I don’t know why I’m such a mess.”

Eddie hummed and graced the crown of Buck’s head with a kiss.

“You’ve been through a lot, Buck. No one expected it to be easy.”

Buck brought his hand up to feel Eddie’s heartbeat in his palm.

“How?”

He was pretty sure he would’ve remembered if he’d called Eddie. At least… he thought he would. To be honest, Buck didn’t know where his phone currently was so…

“Athena called me,” Eddie said. “Said that nurse ambushed you.”

_“You’re so full of shit, it’s a miracle your eyes aren’t brown.”_

“Jocelyn.” Buck felt like he needed to add. She had a name and it didn’t feel right to make her some faceless person.

Eddie grumbled something too low to understand as he tightened his arms around Buck.

“You’re filing that restraining order.”

“She just wanted to talk.”

Another kiss and then cupping of Eddie’s hand at the back of his skull.

“Did you want to talk to her?” He asked carefully.

There’d been a time when Buck would’ve said yes because that had been when Jocelyn was maybe one of the only bright spots in his day when he was laid up in the hospital or trying to pull himself together after the doc had told him he need _another_ surgery. She’d been there for all the good and all the ugly.

“No.”

Because at some point in their relationship, Jocelyn had seen a weak point; she’d spotted a bruise that Buck tried to hide and thought if she pushed on it hard enough, it would go away. She’d inserted herself into his life and mistook pity for caring and Buck didn’t need pity.

He didn’t want it.

“Then there you go,” Eddie said, returning to his nuzzling until Buck was nothing more than a pile of melted limbs in his arms.

It wasn’t until Eddie went to sleep that Buck faced the hard part of deciding what he really wanted. Buck had gotten so used to just accepting what he was given and cherished it until it was taken away again.

_“…The only innocent person in all of this is him.”_

It’d taken a messed-up family who wanted to wreak havoc on anyone they could get their hands on for Buck to see he’d been caught in the fallout of too many people deciding what Buck wanted and what Buck deserved. He’d been an unsuspecting bystander for too long with his own life, watching people pass by in the parade of life and waving until someone would notice he was still alone on the sidewalk.

Athena had noticed because she’d been on the sidewalk too.

And he was hiding from her. Why? Because the moment he let someone close, he got hurt because of them?

He didn’t blame Athena and Bobby for what happened so why were his instincts acting like he did?

_Ellie Costas went limp on the floor and in that moment, Athena didn’t care if she was alive or dead. Silence thundered in her ears as she heaved oxygen through her lips and into her lungs. God Himself could’ve dropped down into that apartment and Athena wouldn’t have heard Him, the silence was that heavy._

_But the silence meant… Athena spied a few remaining zip ties on the small table under Buck’s window and she cuffed Ellie’s hands before pushing away her weapon. The bullet that’d been fired had shattered one of Buck’s windows leading to his balcony sending shards of glass everywhere but that was for another time. Athena’s hand pulsed in time with her heartbeat that felt like it was pounding against the inside of her throat and she struggled onto her hands and knees. The shift in gravity was enough to disorient her that she almost missed him but no… that was the stillness._

_She’d never seen Buck so still._

_“Buck…” Athena gasped, her voice so thin to the sound of her own ears._

_Buck wasn’t moving. His legs were sprawled out like he’d been trying to kick himself free before his lungs gave out and his chest… Oh, his chest… it wasn’t moving. The steady rise and fall of someone breathing was absent._

_She’d never seen him so still. He was just… lifeless._

_No. Athena wasn’t going to let him go. Buck didn’t get to give up. Not after everything. No!_

_Athena crawled over to Buck even when the resurgence of adrenaline flooded her veins making her limbs uncoordinated and awkward._

_“Buck?” The stillness of Buck felt like ice on her hands as she touched his chest._

_The Saran wrap was grotesque in its opaque nature of where the sweat and tears and blood and last of Buck’s air supply had stained the plastic. Athena clawed away the wrapping, digging her nails into whatever she could get, as she frantically tried to clear Buck’s airway._

_She freed the plastic from his nose and mouth and ignored the rest that fell down to his throat because all she could see was closed eyes and blue lips and pure, disturbed stillness._

_“Buck?” She gasped, lifting his over grown body into her arms._

_The long column of his neck bared itself as Buck’s head fell back over the crook of Athena’s elbow._

_“Buck!” Athena tapped on Buck’s face, rubbed on his sternum, and even shook him but he remained unmoving in his frozenness. “Buck! Buck, baby, you need to breathe. Come on, Buckaroo. Breathe for me! Buck!”_

_“Athena?” That was Chimney’s voice, Athena’s brain provided._

_“Oh my God!” And that was Eddie. “Buck!”_

_But he couldn’t hear him. He couldn’t hear any of them. Buck was…_

A surprise at her door when she opened it Saturday morning. Athena couldn’t really believe it. The last time she’d seen Buck he’d all but run out of the door when he saw her so it was a bit of shock to see him standing on her porch.

What wasn’t surprising was the sheepish, dopey smile that was a signature look for the young firefighter. The first time he’d ever laid one of those on her, she’d practically melted on the spot with how adorable he looked.

“Hi,” Buck said. “I’m sorry about yesterday.”

It was different the way Buck and her orbited around one another in an awkward dance of trying not to step on any egg shells. Athena waved him off.

“It’s okay, Buckaroo. There’s coffee ins---”

“Actually,” Buck cut in. “I kind of… need to say this first and I’m afraid if I don’t now then I won’t get it out so…”

Athena wasn’t quite sure she liked the sound of that but the last thing she wanted to do was scare Buck off again. It’d nearly broken her heart to see him running from her the first time, she didn’t think she could survive it the second time.

Buck chewed on his lip and Athena gave him the space he needed to gather his thoughts. Buck ran into things headfirst and brain second. It was part of his charm. But when it was serious? No one could ever keep up with how fast his mind could race. So, the fact that he was taking the time and working up the courage to say what he wanted to say told Athena he wanted to do it right.

All she could do was offer to listen when he was ready.

Buck blew out a nervous breath and pulled a brown paper wrapped bouquet from behind his back. Athena gasped in surprise, the way white lilies always seemed to surprise her, and took the flowers into her arms.

“Buck, they’re beautiful,” Athena said, sniffing the beautiful fragrance. “You didn’t have to!”

“I did actually,” Buck said, beaming as his cheeks pinked with the praise.

Without the flowers to occupy his hands though, meant Buck could only tangle his fingers together in front of him.

“See,” Buck said before clearing his throat. “I uh… I was going to send something like those to my mom for Mother’s Day but after everything that happened… I wanted you to have them.”

“Buck---” Athena frowned because Buck didn’t owe her anything and she would never want to come in between Buck and his own mother no matter her feelings on the woman.

But Buck shook his head. “No… uh see… Back when Bobby had been exposed to that radiation disposal in the tunnel… I um… I kind of admitted to him that he was one of the most important people in my life and the thing is… I don’t have a lot of people who fit in that category. You know, before I started this job, I had Maddie… sort of… but that was about it. But then when I made it into the department it was like I was being invited into somebody’s house for dinner and watching this family and that was all I wanted.”

_“New kid calls himself Buck,” Hen said over her drink. “He’s like a golden retriever puppy on speed. I don’t know how long he’s going to last before Bobby strangles him.”_

Something open and vulnerable flashed across Buck’s face as he admitted, “And… I didn’t realize how much I wanted it until I saw it myself.”

Buck inhaled and laughed at the way it caught on a hitch in his chest. He shoved his hands in his pockets to keep from fidgeting.

“I was uh… I was kind of desperate for it actually.” He dropped his gaze down to his feet as he gave a nervous laugh that sounded too hollow for the Buck she knew. “And the team were cool but they weren’t like how we are now. They were a little distant and probably a little relieved when Bobby fired me.”

Athena wanted to stop him, throw herself in front of all those self-doubts and insecurities, but something told her that Buck needed to untangle this web himself so she stayed quiet. Two shattering blue eyes peeked up at her and she was shaken to see tears despite the meaningful smile on his face.

“I didn’t belong… until you said so. I was this punk who got on everybody’s nerves and I messed up. But… You vouched for me. You accepted me. You were there for me. I wouldn’t be here without you since day one.” Buck pushed his wrist to wipe his eyes and used his arm to hide his sniff. “So, Bobby is one of the most important people in my life but so are you and I---”

There is only so much someone could take and Athena was at her brink as Buck cracked in front of her. She dropped the flowers and rushed forward to catch him as he threw his arms around her and cried a little into her neck.

“You’ve always been there,” he said through his tears and he sounded so relieved that it damn well nearly had Athena in tears too. “Thank you.”

There was some kind of magic that a hug from a mother can bring. The kind that makes kids feel like they can barge through any barrier that stands in their way. The kind that makes them feel seen. Buck didn’t have that. He should. His heart was too golden and too pure to be abandoned on the side of the road. But he didn’t. And he was letting Athena give it to him. That was more than enough of a gift.

They stayed like that until they were both dried up from tears and she leaned back so that she could take his face into her hands and made him listen to what she had to say.

“I am sorry you had to go through everything because of people angry at the world and especially Bobby and me.” Buck opened his mouth but Athena didn’t let him start. “No. I’m sorry, Buck. You didn’t deserve any of it. But I’ve already told you what your job is and it’s to keep loving with your whole heart and you leave the guarding of that heart to me. You understand me?”

Buck nodded and that timid smile on his face got a lot brighter.

“Much better,” she said with a pat to his cheek. “Now, let’s put these flowers in some water and you can tell me all about your date with Eddie before the party starts.”

And Buck spoke about Eddie the same way Athena’s heart flipped every time she looked at Bobby. But that was Buck’s way. He loved unequivocally and unguardedly and Athena couldn’t wait to see him figure that out himself when it came down to it with Eddie. That was for another time though. For now, she could be content to sit with her coffee and listen as Buck, the kid who turned so fiercely protective over a baby that he had the guts to stick up to Athena, wax poetry about a guy who was so perfect for him that it was ridiculous it took them this long to get it together.

But that’s the thing about lonely hearts. Eventually someone will notice and wave and want to love you back and soon you won’t be so lonely anymore.


End file.
